Looking Good on Wood
By the Rev. Rich Lang | Image by Wikimedia Commons
“The Bible’s definition of economic justice is the Jubilee, a far more radical break with capitalism than socialism. The Jubilee posits that the earth and all its resources belong to God. The implication is that we the people are to share the resources so that all survive and thrive.”
-the Rev. Rich Lang
With the election of a socialist to Seattle’s City Council, economic discourse is going to get a bit testy this year. The bottom line is that a person making 20K has different interests and needs than someone making 50K, 100K and even more. The truth is that political decisions are mostly made for those north of 100K. It’s only a matter of time before all heck breaks loose.
I’m hoping that preachers will find their voice so that we too might enter this public debate. One hears from time to time a plea for economic justice from the pulpit, but mostly this plea is just warmed over rather standard free market fare. But if the Church took seriously its own Book there would be a much different application of its proclamation.
The Bible’s definition of economic justice is the Jubilee, a far more radical break with capitalism than socialism. The Jubilee posits that the earth and all its resources belong to God. The implication is that we the people are to share the resources so that all survive and thrive. In order to do this, societies should have built-in legislated limits on wealth accumulation, and debt. Every fifty years wealth should be completely redistributed so that there can be no more aristocracies nor generational poverty. Practically speaking this means that although Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos can, in fact, live and die as wealthy kings, their descendants will need to figure their own privileges out from scratch. It also means that the child of the family on welfare will be given a boost into new opportunities to escape poverty. This is what the Bible means by justice: wealth redistribution legislated by government. It might be thought of as FDR on steroids coupled with Socialist Kshama Sawant’s threat of taking back the infrastructure we the people built for corporations like Boeing.
Now, of course, you never hear your preacher going that far but the Bible goes even farther. It legislates year-long sabbatical rests for the land which means that the earth has “rights” that trump the desire of entrepreneurs to exploit and seize its resources. Labor also has a right to rest. Every seventh year, financial debt was forgiven, and if someone had fallen into hopeless poverty they were to be given the means to become economically self-sufficient.
In this new year when things get really rockin’, I’m hoping that preachers find their voice and organize their congregations to speak truth to those who troll within government, military, and corporate bordellos. I hope that Christians will get out of their pews and into the streets. I hope the Church will practice solidarity with the left out and the least. I hope we will follow Jesus, even though we’ve been warned by Jesuit priest Dan Berrigan, “that if we want to follow Jesus, we better look good on wood”.
Thank you for your post and invitation to consider where we stand personally on God’s call to share all that we have. I agree that the biblical Jubilee is a fitting and gospel sound call to us as persons of faith. In fact, it is critical to remember that the Jubilee requires that all debts be forgiven, right?!!!! How does that mesh with free market capitalism? Not!!
Thanks for reading and thanks for your reply! I really hope Pastor Rich can chime in with our readers to share more of his insights! – Jesse
Good insights, now how do we get people to change their hearts.
In a debt ridden society, this is wishful thinking of the most selfish kind! How does this selfishness mesh with controlled market socialism? Perfectly! Work less, get more! Borrow more, don’t pay your debts. Seems like stealing and selfishness to me, which are not callings to us as persons of faith!
Hi Jeff. A reply from Rich Lang is below.
Jeff,
The Biblical understanding of justice is very much (as the Jubilee is clear about) a government mediated structural issue. The Jubilee penalizes the accumulation of too much wealth, and puts a floorboard under the weight of too much poverty. Bill Gates might prosper but his grandchildren will need to make their own path. God’s justice uplifts the poor and cancels out generational poverty (and aristocracy for that matter). In other words — as Jesus knew quite well –the existence of a debt-economy (e.g. global free market capitalism) is inherently unjust rooted as it is in the accumulated weight of the seven deadly sins. We capitalists have a whole lot of repenting to do — the reign of God is not what currently exists in our economy.